A Few Words About Web Standards

Sterling Web Services builts Web sites that are in compliance with standards created by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Valid Extensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML) is used to construct a meaningful semantic structure for each page. Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) files are used to control the presentation, the visual design, of the site. Additional behaviors are controlled using Javascript, written in a way as to not hinder the user's experience if they have this feature disabled on their browser. It's how the designers of the Web intended for it to be.

This approach produces a site which is easier to develop, use and maintain in several ways:

Faster Browsing
Since each page contains only the code necessary to support the content of that page and the common CSS files are cached by the browser and only need to be downloaded once, page load times are considerably faster.

Search Engine Optimization
A higher percentage of actual content in a page generally results it it being ranked higher by the various search engines.

Improved AccessibilityBy using valid xhtml and css, and structuring the documents in a semantically meaningful way, the site is usable in all Web agents, past, present and future. Agents not compliant with the current stan dards will present a site devoid of style but with the content fully accessable and the navigation fully functional.

Forward CompatibilityIn the near future, this is the way that Web sites will have to be built. Building a compliant site now means not having to rebuild it when that time comes.

Easier MaintenanceSince the code for a page is less cluttered, editing and adding content is easier and much less prone to error. And, since the CSS files are common to all of the pages, editing one file can change the appearance of the entire site.

A Note About Web Browsers

Nearly all modern Web browsers will display a standards compliant Web site as the developer intended. It must be understood that the Web is not print- that is, the Web is a fluid medium and the developer does not have absolute control over how a browser displays a page.

Still, the entire content of a compliant Web site is accessible in every Web user agent. Non-compliant browsers, browsers that don't support CSS and browser's whose users have disabled CSS will simply display the content unstyled.

The latest versions of the following browsers offer generally good support Web standards: